I sometimes hate getting old! The big trend in Hollywood for the last decade has been to remake everything. Most of the time it fails and sucks! I got kind of irritated a few years back when the new version of Battlestar Galactica came out. I hated it but the rest of the world loved it. So at the time I was like, "I hope to God they never do this with Doctor Who!" Well in 2005 that became a reality. But I was surprised, I actually liked it, not as much as the old one because of nostalgia, but I do like it. That was OK when the show hadn't really caught on, but now the new Who is bigger than ever. Now there is this younger generation of fanboys and all they ever talk about is how the new series is superior to the old. I see it on every and I mean EVERY forum! It seems the new series is going to tarnish the legend of the original and that p**ses me off to no end! I like it, but I don't want the classic series to be remembered as just an inferior version of the new one. Of course the effects are cheap it was the 60's and 70's! I almost get confrontational when some snot nosed punk comes up to me when I'm wearing my Tardis tee and starts talking about how great David Tennant or Matt Smith is! I wanna say "Listen you little mother f---er, Doctor who was my show first!!!" I grew up in a small redneck town in North Carolina. Me and my grandpa used to watch the show on the local PBS station. None of the other kids at school knew or cared about this show and that made it special to me. I loved Star Wars and Star Trek and everything, but Doctor Who was truly my own. When I grew up and met other fans of the show it used to be like they were kindred spirits. Now it's no different than meeting the hipster people who like Twilight. Girls hated sci-fi when I was younger and todays faux nerd girls only like David Tennant for his looks and could care less that he's a good actor. I have spent a small fortune on Amazon on the DVDs of the classic series. The new series is great, but I'm almost starting to hate it because it's overshadowing the old series. I hate the younger generation, you have taken my memories and s--t all over them!

True. Always bugs me when I see a survey for the scariest Who monster or the most dangerous Who villain or the best companion. The top picks always end up being mostly from the new series, some of them even kind of ho-hum to my thinking. And then one or two of the very best from the original just barely make it onto the list.

What I like about the new Doctor Who is it hasn't just started from scratch. It's built onto the original show. Everything from the 60s, 70s and 80s still counts, and the makers of the show do a nice job of maintaining that connection. That is a very good thing, but I think it also adds to the frustration of long-time fans who treat the new series as a continuation of the old when we inevitably run into new fans who treat our beloved show as mere backstory.

So many of the fans of the new show are young, raised on effects-laden science fiction, and incapable of appreciating what the original has to offer, or just ignorant of it. I mean, we know so much about the original because we watched it for years when it was still in production. These kids have to care enough to go back and watch it all on video, and understand the show in the context of when it was made. In all but a small fraction of cases, that just ain't gonna happen.

I suppose the original Who is still a pleasure shared by a smaller group of fans who actually get it, just as it always has been. The problem is that these other fans have claimed the new show as their own, and since it's still tied to the old, they've claimed all that history as well, without understanding or appreciating it. And that means the Weeping Angels or the Vashta Nerada are always going to win polls as the scariest Who aliens of all time, and the Zygons are going to be lucky to make the top ten.

I agree with you guys on this so much. I hate when someone always assumes you're talking about something new when you're actually talking something classic...had it happen to me with Halloween, The Outer Limits, The Twilight Zone, Doctor Who, Battlestar Galactica and even Hawaii Five-O. In each and every case, I still prefer the original although I have to admit I do sometimes enjoy the new Who show although to me personally, it feels a bit more dumbed down - like the Doctor is now more superhero than alien scientist. I also thought the newer Battlestar was well done but so different from the original it probably shouldn't even have the same name.

I 100% agree with Jase SF about Halloween. The new ones are just like the other Rob Zombie movies with the Halloween name tacked on. I'm a John Carpenter fan all the way. AndyC you really put this in perspective for me. This is a new show to the young fans and most aren't going to dig back. When I was a kid I tried to watch all the old Sci-Fi that I read about and of course I was gonna like John Carpenter's The Thing better than A Thing From Another World because it's the kind of effects movie I was used to seeing. But I think remakes are made today for instant name recognition. I just wish Russel T. Davis would have come up with something else instead. I think he wanted Doctor Who to be more like Captain Jack in Torchwood, but I don't think the BBC was ready for a gay Doctor. But I guess it wouldn't be fair to the character not to explore his feelings about his companions. With all that time in the Tardis, it would be down right stupid if he wasn't attracted to at least one of them. When Steven Moffat took over, I think he wanted it to be a little more like the old series, but still cater to the new fans. I was skeptical when I read that Matt Smith was only 25 (it's the first time in my life that the current Doctor is younger than me, although Tennant's just a little older). But when I watched him I was hooked and thought it was even better than the Tennant era. I guess in today's world if you want any young girls to watch at all, you have to make The Doctor young and good looking. The pretty girl companions were always there for the dads, so now that we live in a more sexually equal society we have to cater to the female viewers. All of that is fine, but they couldn't do that with the old show and people who didn't live in those times dont seem to understand that. Some people now say that Talons of Weng-Chieng is racist. I just hope the day doesn't come when I start feeling about Doctor Who the way I do about the Star Wars prequels. Don't even get me started on J.J. Abrams Star Trek.

This remaking classics has been a thorn in my side for years. Like the new Dallas....from what little I've seen it just seems to be using the old series for a backdrop and the original actors as props to pull in the older viewers and to give it some credibility. I don't like remakes for the most part,like the new Hawaii 5-0....no thank you! I'm an old gal who prefers the oldies but goodies. I just don't think the new Dallas will ever overshadow the first series because it just doesn't seem to be as good.

I think the soap genre is harder to remake than Sci-Fi because it's so actor oriented, where as in Sci-Fi the effects can cover up a bad performance or story sometimes. And some classic stars can't be replaced. I don't think you have to worry about Dallas because JR is as iconic a character on American TV as Archie Bunker or The Fonz. It's hard to imagine anyone else in those parts. If Tom Baker had been the only actor playing Doctor Who it may have never been remade. But with seven doctors in the original, three in the new series, one in a TV movie and let's not forget Peter Cushing in the 60's Dalek movies, Doctor Who could be remade infinity number of times. The Brits are less clingy, I think that's why they go through so many James Bond's.

One thing different about that new Dallas is the old actors actually are still a part of the show albeit more in the background with the spotlight more on the younger set. I haven't watched it but I noticed in promos for it they feature the old stars more prominently but one can still tell it's another "we're all young and good-looking so nevermind we cannot act" style series [outside the old stars of course].

The original Looney Tunes never sacrificed entertainment for the sake of being safe. Today's cartoons have to be so watered down so Warner Bros. won't get sued if a kid gets hurt. Kids don't get hurt because of cartoons, kids get hurt because parent's don't teach common sense anymore! TV shows would be a lot better if today's parents didn't expect the TV to do their job for them.

I thought some of the Tennant shows were brilliant, while others just felt like big bloated high concept sci-fi. I think the Matt Smith episodes are closer in theme to the classic episodes. The last two that I saw looked like they were going to be one thing and then, surprise! Plot twist. There are some changes in the character of the Doctor in the new series that I have a bit of trouble with. While the Doctor was always brave and a bit arrogant he was never too much of a tough guy in the old series (except for Pertwee). So I wish the writers would cut back on all the machismo Matt's Doctor likes to throw around. The Doctor has to act intimidating in every episode. That's not the benevolent alien as he was portrayed by every other actor. But that may be more of the writer's fault than Matt's. The romance stuff with David's Doctor and Rose seemed a bit much but I understood the reasons they did it. They wanted a bigger female audience so they cast a good looking guy like Tennant. Plus Rose was hot, so of course they would fall for each other. They were smart to divert the Doctor and Amy's relationship into Amy and Rory, that was a good twist. It also made the statement that the Doctor is a loner, which explains why he never had relations with his companions. Peter Davison always portrayed the Doctor as flawed, which I liked. Tom Baker's usually confident Doctor, always acted nervous around women. Jon Pertwee may have been macho but he didn't seem to have the darkness that Smith brings into it. William Hartnell had some of that, but it's easier to digest because he was such an old man. Even Colin Baker's Doctor being middle aged and sarcastic downplayed his darker side when it came out. Smith's angry young man who's really an old man approach seems to bug me sometimes. I was surprised how much I liked it when Centurion Rory punched him out. I don't think in the old series the Doctor was ever in a situation where you didn't like him (unless he had a secret reason like in Invasion of Time). It also bugged me when some football player who was a fan kept calling him a superhero in an interview. I think the new fans see the Doctor as a superhero. Where as the old fans saw him as hero but also (despite being alien) very human.

Degrassi Jr High is a teenie after school special. But as a teenager I enjoyed the 80's version off the show, simply cause it was all 80's. They updated it to relate to todays teenagers. With the Cell phones, internet and other new trends, but the new version did not have as good charectors, and they did not really adress the new issues off todays youth which is pretty much all the issues addressed on the 80s verson only taken up to 11 with high does off stupidity tossed into everyone around us. Hence why people do stupid things like remakes. I mean why not just repaint the mona lisa for christ sake?

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Then I did not just look into the mirror, I looked through the mirror...

As a member of said generation, could you cut us some slack? Quite a bit of advertising doesn't make it obvious that there was an original, and older works were made for another generation. There is always going to be that smaller part of the fandom that goes back to watch the original stuff (myself usually being part of that group), but sometimes there's just nothing really there for us to relate to, especially if it relies on references and jokes you had to be there to understand. Anyway, if you enjoy something, why do you have to prove to someone else that you're "worthy" of enjoying it? Why do we have to put in extra effort when all you did was enjoy the show/movie when it originally came out?

I personally find some remakes and updates insulting; is this crap something they really think "speaks" to me? Is this is really what they think of my generation? I know we can be confrontational with our elders, and yeah there is a tendency to want to see more violence and sex on TV...but that's not just our generation. Previous generations have rebelled against their parents, and wanted to see more sex and violence in their media. The way certain remakes seem to want to portray us, however, you'd think everyone below 30 had a personality disorder. For the record, it's not us making these things. Not yet. It's still mostly the previous generation; some of us are just starting to get into the entertainment industry, but we're still mostly too wet behind the ears to be trusted to helm anything with a recognizable name.

Finally, I want to point out that girls and women have been geeks for a long time. It's just that until recently, you weren't allowed to be open about it at all. I think it used to be that you had to live vicariously through your male family members, borrowing their stuff without them knowing, or waiting until something came on TV while you were alone in the house. Or you had to accept being the only chick in a room full of guys who might not have much experience talking to women (I've heard horror stories from women who went to conventions, comic book shops, etc before the "geek girl" was common, and I'm glad I'm young enough to have avoided the worst of that.)

I admit that sci- fi fandom used to be a boys club, but I personally never knew any girls that were into when I was growing up. But maybe they had to keep it a secret, I can relate. I became a heavy metal musician in my teens, so yeah, I kept my nerdy side in the closet for years. I'm glad we at least live in a world today where in some circles being a nerd is actually cool. I certainly don't want to be insulting to female fans, but for some reason I think the writers of today's entertainment are pandering to them and to younger viewers by making things they think you want to see. The real motive for this topic was me feeling old about these remakes and seeing if anyone could relate. I think I would find it easier if Hollywood would just stop remaking every single thing under the sun.